Reflections
by Snowman1
Summary: Fed up with the spy life, Sydney takes up Noah's old offer and runs away.
1. Chapter 1

****

Reflections

Note: This is not trying to explain the events leading up to "The Telling's" shocking finale. It's instead an idea that I have been playing with for a while. Welcome to the Snowman's world. Some would expect Noah's still living; no. He died. But Francie's good. Sloane is still on the run with Sark, but Irina's on hot pursuit, working fully with the CIA. Jack has retired, and occasionally does some research or gets into contact with necessary operatives. Will is head analyst, Sydney and Vaughn are dating, SD-6 is still around… I don't think anything else needs explaining…

Walking through Credit Dauphine. And Noah was beside her. They entered the elevator, and he continued their conversation. "Syd, you think I'm kidding? I'm not kidding. I want you to go away with me."

"My point is, what happened the other night... it was just too soon," Syd replied

"Russia's got a hell of a bootleg software industry," Noah tried to convince her. "When I was there, I figured out a way of skimming money off the Russian mob."

"What are you talking about?" Syd said, and began to realize it could work.

"I got a lot of money hidden in several offshore accounts. Syd, I'm getting out. I'm sick of lying to everyone I know. I'm at the point where the idea of just walking away from all these people that are supposed to be my good friends - my best friends - is a relief. Now you tell me you've never felt that way."

The elevator reached their floor, and they entered that annoyingly bright white room.

"I'm just saying that I've got someone helping me out. I'm not kidding, Syd. I want you to come with me."

And it flashed red.

"I can't tell you where, but I can tell you that we won't need locks on the doors and you will learn how to surf," Noah said, trying to argue every point.

And Sydney, unintentionally, blurted out her response.

"I'd love it. Let's go!"

She awoke with a start, and sat straight up. She had been having the same dream, repeatedly, for the last week and half now. Every time, she had a different response. When the dreams started, Sydney had refused. But lately, her responses were getting more and more positive. And she couldn't help but think that she could do it. Run away. To an island where nobody would find her. Where she could live without having to know how to break every bone in an enemy's body.

A place in the Atlantic ocean, preferably.

She sat up, and began to plan it out…

***(The next morning)

"Morning, sleepy head!" Francie called out, getting up from the couch, as Sydney emerged from her room. Syd could tell that she was trying to readjust her top, and that could only mean…

"Yeah, good to see you. It's like 12 o'clock…" Will called out a little confused. The distinct sign of a zipper being zipped could be heard, and he too got up.

"We left you some breakfast; I was too lazy to cook this morning, but oh well!"

Syd looked at the table, and there was a carton of white rice, a bottle of soy sauce, and a bowl of chicken wings…

"You're a lazy ass, I hope you know that Francie," Syd yelled to the couple. She slowly began to eat the rice, but it was cold and hard as a block. As the rice was microwaving, Sydney looked around her apartment in regret. She would miss it, but she was determined to leave; she was sick and tired of a double life. Will noticed her distraught, and asked, "You okay over there?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah, I'm fine. Just thinking about… the bank," Sydney told him, trailing off.

"Oh shit! I've gotta go write something for my magazine!" he said, hurrying off, and grabbing his coat off the hook, and he went out the door.

"Francie, I've gotta talk to you about something."

"What's up, is everything ok with Michael?"

"No, that's not it," Syd said, and she pulled the rice out of the microwave. "France, I don't work at the bank."

"What do you mean, you don't work at a bank? Where [I]do[/I] you work, then?" Francie was almost a little worried that she had been lied to by her "best friend."

"You're not gonna believe me, France- you really won't."

"Tell me," she said with concern for her friend.

"I'm sorry I had to lie to you, Francie. But they made me sign thousands of non-disclosure documents."

"Just end the melodrama, Sydney. Where the hell do you work?" By now, a single tear had escaped Francie's ducts.

Sydney, too, began to cry, as she started to explain the whole story. "It all started one day in the park, this man came up to me…" and the story continued, with Danny and his death, her dad working with her unbeknownst to her, her betrayal of SD-6, the mad hunt for Sloane since then, and, of course, the true conditions of her relationship with Vaughn.

"Why are you telling me this?" Francie was still distraught, but through her tears, the question came out. "Why me?"

Sydney closed her eyes for five seconds, trying to come up with a reason. "My friend, Emily, recently died. And I couldn't stand having to lie to her about what I did. And after that experience, I feel like you should know."

"I can't believe this, how can you work for the CIA? You're too nice to be a spy!"

"Truth takes time, Francie. I would have told you eventually, but I just had to do it now. Oh, and one more thing. Don't tell anyone I had this conversation. I want to tell Will about it myself. Don't even let on that we had this conversation, Ok?"

In her confusion, Francie agreed. The two hugged in a teary mess, their first since Charlie.


	2. Chapter 2

"Ahhh!"

Sydney woke up again, the same dream. Insecurities flooded back to her, and she remembered that she had finally decided to do it. The date was set; Friday, June 20th, 2003, Sydney Bristow would no longer exist, and a small island's population was all set to go up 1 person.

But was she ready to do it? To leave Vaughn, Will, and Jack, all those she loved, behind? Was she ready to leave?

At the same time, her life was getting more hectic. Francie knew, Sloane was sure to find out her cover soon, which was the last thing she could afford. And the CIA constantly expecting her to keep everything in check? She couldn't do it any longer. Yes, Sydney was sure this was the best thing to do.

***

"Marshall?"

Sydney tried to enter the makeshift room that Marshall called his office, and when she opened the door, she saw him listening to some music on his headphones.

Slowly, she walked over to him and tapped his shoulder. He turned quickly, his eyes wide open. He quickly, mumbling some apologies, took off his headphones and looked up at his long-time friend. "I thought you were Mr. Sloane, which would be bad because, well, you know, I'm not supposed to bring in my, uh, y'know."

"Right," Sydney said. While trying to keep a smile, she thought to herself, "I'm gonna miss him…"

"Something happened to my home computer, Marshall. A virus was run, and it deleted only specific things. It only deleted things with my name on it, not Francie's or just other files. How does that work?"

Marshall thought about it for a bit, and then said "Well, it probably just ran a find, you know… like clicking on the start menu and selecting find, and then typing in a key word, which in this case was most likely 'Sydney' or 'Bristow," or even 'Sydney Bristow.' But there's nothing I can do, if that's why you're here. I mean, it's deleted. It's strange, though, I've never heard of a virus like that…"

"Neither had I, which is why I came to you. And you said the files are irretrivable?"

"Yeah, because, I mean, the files were specifically targeted and then deleted, instead of just randomly, or even methodically, like taking a whole folder, or something. Since they were specifically targeted, they're just, poof, gone, you know?"

"I see. Well, thankfully, I didn't lose anything terribly important. All my SD-6 files were saved with one of my Aliases."

"That's good to hear, because, I mean, Sloane would be…" Marshall started, but Sydney cut him off.

"Thank you," and she started to walk out the door. Hanging out of the doorway, she turned back and hugged Marshall, and gave him a kiss on the cheek. "Congratulations, by the way." She said with a wink. Marshall looked down at his hand, and the light gleamed off his finger.

***

"Come on, Syd, we're gonna be late!"

"I'm having a little trouble with my dress, go without me Vaughn. I don't want you to miss the wedding."

Feeling rejected, Vaughn headed out the door of the apartment. He was looking forward to driving Sydney to Marshall's wedding, some girl named Carrie Bowman that he had met a sushi bar. And, while at the time he found it hard to believe that Marshall would either fall in love or have an active enough social life to go to a sushi bar, he had accepted the fact that Sydney wanted him there to spend time with her, so he was going. 

In her room, Sydney heard the door close and the tires screech, so she went to her PC. She quickly sent a letter to Weiss' CIA Email address. The same email was sent to Dixon at SD-6. Both had the title "Reflections." In it, Sydney told both of them to thank all the people at their respective offices of work for being so nice to her for all this time. It also contained a secretly attatched file that would delete anything with the keywords "Sydney Bristow," "Kate Jones," or any of her other Aliases from both computer networks. Public records had been taken care of, and all forms of identification had been successfully burned. The desks she worked at were already dusted and wiped for fingerprints, making it impossible to copy them again. As a precaution, she had bought latex fingertips with new prints. Her passport's magnetic strip was altered, and the picture replaced. The name wasn't Sydney anymore, but Natasha Smalls. Her mud-brown eyes had been changed to a shade of hazel with modern contacts. The hair was blonde, and a luscious tan from many tanning booths now took over her skin tone. She didn't even recognize herself anymore. "Damn, I'm good."

Careful to use just opened leather gloves, she left an envelope on her counter. It was addressed simply as "Michael." She then walked to the train station. On the way over, her car mysteriously exploded. With a smile on her face, she put on heavy dark sunglasses and continued her walk to the station.

***

"Do you, Carrie Bowman, take Marshall Flinkman as your lawfully wedded husband, to have and…"

Vaughn all of the sudden lost focus in the wedding, and he began to wonder where Sydney was. Perhaps she was abducted. Perhaps something else had happened. No matter the case, she wasn't here and the wedding was almost over. All through the wedding, he had noticed Jack having trouble focusing like Vaughn was. As soon as the priest had finally shut up, and that was the way that Vaughn saw it, he rushed out the door and drove in his car to her house. The car wasn't there, but there was police tape everywhere. As an officer walked by, Michael asked her "What happened?"

"Car bomb and a possible homicide."

"I'm CIA and trained in these matters," Vaughn said, flashing his ID. The officer checked it and let him in. He noticed the envelope addressed to him, and opened it. A silver pen fell out of the envelope, with the words "I love you" engraved on it. There was also a letter, but he couldn't read it through his tears. 

As he left the apartment, his face was thoroughly soaked. Jack saw him exit and ran up to him. "Agent Vaughn, what happened?"

"I found this," he said between sobs. "She's gone; I gave her my heart, she gave me a pen, and…" but from there, he broke down. He couldn't have expressed what he needed to anyway, not through his tears.

"She's gone?" Jack asked, beginning to shed a tear


	3. Chapter 3

It had been a week since Sydney disappeared. Vaughn was still in hysterics, but he was calming down a little. His tears had stopped long enough for him to read the letter that was left with the pen.

__

Dear Michael,

I know you probably had misgivings about reading this. My intention was to make it look like a murder, so classically this would be a ransom note. I need you to know that I am okay. But I've been fed up with this spy life for too long now. I can't stand not being able to tell Francie the truth about where I work, I can't stand having to look Arvin Sloane directly in the eye and lie to him, day by day. But most of all, I can't stand the stress you cause in my life. How we can't date or the Alliance will se us, how we can't break protocol in the headquarters and display our affections to one another.

But there is a way to change this. Tomorrow, meet me in the park. I can give you a ticket to come live with me. I can't tell you where, but I can tell you wee won't need locks on our doors, and we'll learn how to surf: together.

This pen, enclosed with the letter, has been something of a family heirloom to me. It meant a lot to me when I got it, and now I want you to have it. Keep it with you at all times, as a reminder of all the times we've shared, and our intense love for one another.

I love you, forever and for always,

Sydney. 

When he read it, Vaughn immediately latched onto the second paragraph. The chance to leave his world of deception was tempting, and to live with Sydney was icing on the cake. But the more he thought about it, the more he realized he could never, and would never, leave the CIA. His life was with the government, and he knew that this proposition would be foolish and wasteful. The morning after she ran, Vaughn turned on the news.

"…And the mystery around CIA officer Sydney Bristow continues," the anchor said, with a picture appearing over her shoulder. Those same mud-brown eyes that Mike loved so much stared directly into him. He recognized the picture as her CIA profile picture, and he twitched with his decision to stay. "Bristow's not the only member of her family to strangely disappear; Almost thirty years ago, Sydney's mother, Laura Bristow aka Irina Derevko, faked her own death. After successfully infiltrating the CIA through agent Jack Bristow, Derevko returned to her native Russian and continued working for her own organization."

Vaughn pulled out a beer from the fridge and sat back down. "Hurry up and talk about Sydney!" he grumbled under his breath.

"Just yesterday, Sydney's car exploded, and left no trace of the Double Agent: the is no sign of here _anywhere_. In other news…"

But with that statement, Vaughn plucked a bottle cap at the TV and shut it off. He dressed in a suit and headed to the Operations Center.

***

"Thanks again for letting me stay here, with you, Will," Francie managed between sobs.

"No problem. They'll probably stay cleaning out your house, looking for clues, for a day or two," Will said, grunting while putting down her bags. Then, with a quick kiss, he told her, "You're welcome here any time, anyway."

Smiling, she sat down on his couch. In a quick movement, she wiped away her tears. "Will?" she asked, "Did Sydney mention anything important before she, you know…"

"No, nothing important. Why?"

"She told me something, and she was going to tell you, but it's too late…" Francie trailed off, and bit her lip. "Sydney doesn't work at a bank, Will."

The former reporter, who was searching hard for some ice cream, became chilled. "What do you mean?" he asked with a quavering voice.

"She works for the CIA. And Danny wasn't just _randomly_ killed, he - " 

"And she told you all this?" Will asked with wide eyes. The freezer door hung ajar, and Will was genuinely worried by now.

"Yeah, why?"

With a look of pure concern, he turned towards the door. " We have to go."

"What? Why?"

"NOW, Francie!"

***

"Jack, unless you can offer me some solid proof that your daughter is still alive, I'm afraid there's nothing I can do." Kendall was just in one of those moods, as always, and Jack was on the receiving end.

"Do you have any children, Kendall?"

"Do you have any _judgement_, Jack? It wouldn't seem so, since you're about to ramble on about Paternal Instincts!"

"Or maybe I would lecture you on hope, how it's the only thing that can keep a father going!" By now, the entire L.A. division of the CIA was watching the heated argument. "She's all that's kept me here after Derevko turned herself in!

Looking around the room, Kendall gave his final argument. "But there is nothing to believe in! She's de - "

The word never finished as two massive hands gripped Kendall's throat tightly. But hope re-instated itself when Vaughn charged through the doors, parading the letter in his hand.

"Jack, she's alive!"

At the same time, Will entered a side door, dragging Francie by the wrist. "Assistant Director!" he cried. A blue Kendall looked up at him. "Sydney told Francie here about her involvement with the CIA. She must have planned this all! She's alive, sir!" Smiling, he turned around and shouted it for all to hear. "ALIVE!"

Kendall turned to Jack. Clearly exasperated, he told him, "You have 2 weeks!"


	4. Chapter 4

AJack, we=re running out of ideas. I=m sorry, but it=s true.@

And true it was. After two weeks had passed, Jack, Vaughn, and Will were meeting in a room that was mostly occupied by a table, and solely lit by a dying bulb. The three men were continually coming up with nothing in their leads. Two maps hung up on the wall: There was one of the United States, and the other showed the world. Both had thumbtacks ranging from red to blue, sporadically placed at, seemingly, random places.

AAlright, let=s just thing about this for a minute,@ Will suggested. Exhaustion plagued his eyes, and beard, as stubble was coming in. AShe=s gone, and doesn=t want to be found. The way I see it is she=ll either try to hide in a big city, or anticipate us thinking this, so she=ll hide in a small town. Most likely she B Will you put that down, Vaughn!@ The last statement was directed to Vaughn who was finishing off a bottle of beer. Angered at the lack of respect Vaughn showed, Will reached across the table and slapped the bottle out of his colleagues hand, making it shatter all over the ground.

ACan=t, dude!@ Vaughn shouted, the all too familiar glazed eyes and stupefied smirk were on his face. AI=m surfin=!@

AWhat the hell are you smokB surfing?@ Will asked, curiously.

For the first time in hours, Jack looked up from his laptop and the papers strewn around on the table, and made a connection that Will made at the same time.

AYep, yep!@ Vaughn chuckled in his drunken stupor. ASurfing with Sydney! Sydney Surfing!@ He took a stereotypical surfer=s pose, his arms out for balance. But that necessary balance gave way to drunkenness, and he collapses. Will and Jack, disgusted by Vaughn=s display, both went to their main source of information: The letter.

A...But I can promise you we won=t need locks on our doors, and we will learn how to surf: together.@

This was a lead: a solid lead, left by Sydney herself. They scoured their maps for any pins on shore or islands with particularly good beaches.

AJack!@ Will exclaimed, pointing to Japan. One red pin lay on a minor island, just outside of the mainland. ADue to the constant tsunamis and hurricanes over there, the beaches are likely to be... to be...@ struggling to come up with a word, Agnarly@ popped out of his mouth.

At the sound of the surfer lingo, Vaughn cried out ASurf=s up, dude!@

***

AArigato.@

The police officer bowed, and turned away, leaving Jack with no choice but to return to his party of three.

AHe said she should be in...@ he began to count the houses along the shore, until he stopped at a white, one story building. He counted again to be sure, and finally said, Athat one.@

They trooped together, all three of them, including the now sober Vaughn, towards the house,. They all wore black tactical gear, in case anything went wrong. Their suits cooked in the sun as they crossed the beach. The crowds stopped their activity and began to murmur amongst themselves as they watched the three Americans try to open a door, and eventually resort to kicking it down with flashlights blaring and assault rifles ready.

All at once, three beams landed on the TV with the snow screaming. It was Vaughn who saw the VCR and the tape on top of it. They all looked at each other, and unspokenly agreed to play it. It started off with just the eye of Rambaldi, red on a black background. After a second of confusion between the trio, a black robed man stepped in front of the eye, and looked directly into the camera. He pulled down his hood to reveal short, black hair and Asian skin. He clasped his hands in front of him and smiled an evil smile.

AHello!@ he said, with a voice oozing of evil, deep and harsh. AI assume you=re looking for prophecy girl. I=m sorry.@


	5. Chapter 5 Mini, dedicated to Coffee Craz...

"I assume you're looking for prophecy girl. I'm sorry. Because the most likely scenario here is that you won't find her. Ever. That's got a lot to do with your imminent deaths." 

He took a moment to bite on his finger, with that evil smile still lurking about him. 

"You see, this was her house. For about 3 days. And that's partly my fault: I mean, come on! It took me three days to notice that prophecy girl was on my turf? I thought I was getting wreckless. The plan was, of course, to rig this building with C4,and as soon as you entered, blow the place to bits. But Sydney: you don't mind if I call her that, do you? Sydney likes games. Her whole running away was meant to be a game: a "Catch me if you can," sort of deal. So I'll play a game on you: This VCR is hooked up to the entire house. And with this specially altered tape, I can make the lights go off." 

A click signified the light going off, and darkness ensued. 

"Or I could, I don't know," he said with a shrug. "Lock the doors? Bar the windows?" In perfect concordance with his speech, the door shut, and bars slammed down on the window. 

"But most fun of all, I can blow you to smithereens."


	6. Chapter 6

The screen turned to black with red numbers counting down from one minute.  
  
59  
  
58  
  
Jack and Vaughn tried to concentrate on a way out of the building, while Will went about trying to stop the explosion from happening.  
  
53  
  
"The walls are too thick!" Vaughn cried in desperation. "We can't break them down without a small explosion."  
  
"And given the way this cottage is so small, I'm guessing that's a bad idea, right?" the voice came from behind the television.  
  
47  
  
"Shut up, Will! You do your work, we do ours!" Vaughn and Will broke the eye contact they had made during their confrontation, and each returned to their unassigned positions  
  
45  
  
"Wait, what do we have with us?"  
  
"Jack." Vaughn began.  
  
"We don't have time! What did we bring with us?"  
  
41  
  
"Just our guns and our cellphones." Vaughn retorted, trying to maintain his calm.  
  
38  
Will looked at the wires, and still didn't know what to do. He had tried pressing stop, which only seemed to make the countdown speed up. It also gave him an unfortunately large shock. He didn't want to take a chance and press any of the other commands on the VCR. Instead, he turned to the back of the television and began trying to technologically disable the imminent explosion. In the back were wires of every color imaginable. Red, white, yellow, black, cyan, magenta. it was an amazing set up, but he didn't know what to pull. With his experiences with the buttons, he knew one move could be fatal. Being the analyst in the group, he spent what time he could afford trying to logically deduct which to pull or cut.  
  
28  
  
"I don't know what to do! There are too many choices!" Will yelled.  
  
"Cut the power!" came Jack's reply.  
  
Will looked at the wall and noticed that five wires were plugged in. Each were black, and each looked like they could easily lead back to the VCR. With no other choice in mind, Will chose the closest power cord and began to trace it back through the jungle of tangled wire  
  
23  
  
"Stand back." Jack's warning was enough for Vaughn to retreat to the far wall of the cabin and watch as Jack removed the gun powder he could from Vaughn's pistol. He gathered it all into a pile. Acting carefully, he set one cellphone to vibrate mode, and placed its antenna in the trigger of his own pistol.  
  
15  
  
He entered his phone number as quickly as he could and watched as the phone vibrated. vibrated  
  
10  
  
The vibrations from the phone fired the gun, which sparked onto the mass of gunpowder. While small, the explosion had the effect Jack wanted it to have, and created a crack in the wall.  
  
9  
  
"Michael, help me!" together the two men began kicking at the little crevice they had made, watching it expand.  
  
8  
  
And expand. It was now about two feet tall, and pieces of wood were crumbling beneath it.  
  
7  
  
"I've got it!" Will cried as he found the right cord to the VCR. He reached to pull it out from the wall. A much more powerful shock sent him across the room, where he hit his head on a conveniently placed windowsill. The power of the shock and the collision knocked the analyst unconscious.  
  
3  
  
"Will!" Vaughn screamed.  
  
At this point, the crack became a sufficient crawl space, and Jack was outside and waiting. In fact, Vaughn was already backing out when Will flew across the room.  
  
1  
  
The flashing number on the screen alerted Vaughn of the seriousness of the issue, and he finished backing out.  
  
Instead of flashing zero, the Rambaldi eye came up. And then the C4 inside the tape was triggered, and the cottage went up in a massive fire ball. Vaughn had just left the cabin and was teasingly licked by the flames, but escaped unhurt. Hoping for Will's survival was too much to ask for.  
  
Everyone around them, on the beach, watched on in amazement and horror. Vaughn was crying, yet again, on Jack's shoulder. Jack silently swore revenge on his new Asian nemesis for the loss of his colleague.  
  
20 feet down the beach, a short German man stood up and walked away. He pulled out a walkie-talkie.  
  
"Yes sir, they came."  
  
"No sir"  
  
"Well, two of them did, sir."  
  
"I'll see to it, sir."  
  
His last statement was in reference to their assassination, but he had it saved for a later time. It was about time that Drohung was recognized as a threat to the CIA. 


End file.
